Ashes to Ashes
by Aimlessly Unknown
Summary: Their dreams fall down. Team Seven.


_Disclaimer_: I do not own.

_Summary_: Their dreams fall away.

* * *

_littlemedicwarrior._

Her voice is lucid and lofty and soft on the air around them. Her fighting moves are razor-sharp and taut, like a coil that bursts and comes u n d o n e. Plus she can heal _anythingandeverything_, how else do you make the perfect k u n o i c h i?

(She's not going to lose again.)

People love her, and they cheer her on as she puts the fight back in Konoha and the dream back in the hearts of the people who trust her( - but oh god, Sasuke is gone and Naruto is leaving and she's not sure she was even there in the first place). She just hateshateshates the dependency, how can they depend on someone who's hands tremble? And she'll just keep going f o r e v e r & e v e r until she finally falls (because she's a perfect killer with a pretty face, just like in the _horriblegodawful_nightmares) and falling beats what happens normally to nightmares like her.

But, god, then she can feel it all falling away like chakra ( - but the chakra is warm and tingly and this is just _hell_) when she sees Sasuke again. Because she's been fighting and wanting and (godshewantsit) to get him back; and within ten minutes she's stumbling and stuttering and there's nothing left in her heart ( - why couldn't he kill her when he had the c h a n c e).

But he's out of chances and she won't let it happen to her. Not now.

So she will follow Sasuke and Naruto into the shadows.

( - wondering if she'll ever come back, along the way _d o w n_.)

.

_mistermonsterfox._

The first time Naruto fingers the Kyuubi's chakra, it is warm and it feels like fire in his belly. The feeling is, quite simply, beautiful, made out of shining _something_ and giving the flowing red a tinge of the h o m e he's never had.

(He likes to think he doesn't need it

- he's _lied_ before.)

He manages to hide his new power from Hokage-sama, letting his hands get used to the feel of the heat on his skin; the warmth lingers on his skin like the smell of b l o o d. With the heat _fadinfadingfading_ like the sun on the edge of the horizon he looks up and sees _no one_ just like all the other times he's looked ( - it hurts more each time.)

After that, the empty silence starts to frost, and the warmth does nothing to soothe him (did you finally give up on me?). The endless ice makes his skin sticky and gross and he refuses to touch the warmth again (and he swears he can still feel the nerve endings light up like a firecracker).

God, he wishes he could feel the heat beneath his skin and make the world feel his warmth (but he only every heard people whisper ihateyou to the wind).

When he's twelve, he runs away (but is it running when Jiraiya is with him?). He connects with the demon chakra time after time before then but it is only now that it doesn't scald him, only now when he has a protector and power so near. There are no more angry eyes or bad memories, and here all the people look exactly like his village's (just a little less cruel and a lot more pretty). Here, his dreams feel like they could lift him up and let him ::flylittlebirdy:: _soar_.

His feet never get off the ground.

.

_misterchronicavenging. _

He's just so goddamnweak.

It's all a mask, all a disease ridden mongrel beneath sharp bones and pretty eyes that howls and cries to the moon at night while he sits in his mother's room and screams (iwillavengeyou). He's not real.

Really, it's all about being an avenger. It's all about the power that the Dobe gets at a whim (it'snotfuckingfairisit?) when he wants to protect people. It's not about protection, it's about c o n t r o l and m u r d e r and killing the only person he's ever _loved_.

(Let the rivers run red.)

When he leaves Sakura, he can see and feel the lieslieslies that lift off her lips in a feeble attempt to make him stay, feel her desperation. When he kisses her, she tastes like d r e a m s and bright stars and her skin still seems to shiver in her unconsciousness. She's just a little bit like an a n g e l_ (memories of a nicer time)_. Her touch is kind and useless when he's bleeding on the inside.

In a way, he thinks he'd like to love her. But he'd only bring her down.

So he'll keep her away, he'll _pushpushpush_ and never keep still as he runs away from her, away from her warm eyes and shining hands and all things that make him weak (because bruises and shattering screams are easier to deal with than a l o v e that makes him want to stay.)

_Oh fuck it burns._

(Like the broken walls and bloody floors and the smell of despair_and_pain_and_revenge.)

.

_mistertimingiseverything._

At a young age, Kakashi learns to just shuthisfuckingmouth because a good ninja is quiet and strong and a c o l d b l o o d e d k i l l e r. His father teaches him this lesson well. His father is a _disgraceembarrassment _but he knows how to kill. He knows how to make blood run down the walls.

(Papa Hatake kills himself a week later.)

Kakashi does not speak for ten months, he mourns, and he mourns his father, his teacher, his only friend. It is in these ten months he meets his family – his only family. He sees his teacher with green eyes ( - so different from red and it's his only reprieve), he meets his medic with purple cheeks ( - they do not flush near him, they light up), and his best friend ( - death doesn't go away.)

(Why does he do this? Condemn himself to this? Oh yeah, '_it's his duty_'; his father doesn't know the meaning of the word.)

What Kakashi knows, however, is that he _lovesneeds_ these people; the ones where Rin smiles and goddamn means it, and Obito smirks and taunts him with a loudloud voice and Minato-sensei is warm and fatherly and god he wants this. He likes being needed, how he has to protect_or_lose Rin and Obito and how Sensei tells him how proud he is with the voice that raised the dead. He can take his mask off here and be the one person he's wanted to be and always will want to be and will need to be ( - a hero), he will be the victor and the saviour.

Porn_and_TeamSeven_and_Sake make him forget the pain, after all he loves to _forgetloseeverything_.

He watches the ghosts of his past dance.

.

.

.

_Slice, slice_ let the kunai run red and let them scream; they cannot be saved _slice, slice_ let your smile be kind and your fists be unforgiving, do not let them think, for a moment, that they are s a f e.

_(They think you love them? Hah, let them think that. But do not fall for them. Kill them swiftly, be the friend confidant but do not let them know your secrets. Hide behind your mask, hide the killer eyes, and hide the scarred fists. But do not hide when Death comes. You must die with honor. Be the living death.)_

_._

We are Team Seven, and we will f i g h t or we will d i e.

(_and maybe we'll do both_.)


End file.
